Falk wrote:Rev. had a thread with tons ov special abilities somewhere, it was called Homebrew Special Abilities or something like that.

Indeed I do, but the thread is a little out of date given some of the recent advancements in the 2010 rules and weapons. But still usable probably.

I'll weigh in on this thread because my friends and I devised an RPG-like feel for brikwars that was based heavily on the old GW game Mordheim. For those who do not know, Mordheim is a table-top skirmish game that allows heroes and grunts to level up over time.

For our system, minifigs and heroes were able to gain xCP (stands for "experience" Construction Points), over the course of battles and games in order to boost their abilities. xCP was accumulated for completing predetermined objectives during the game. An average medieval game might have the following objectives: +1 xCP for every foe killed, +1xCP for rescuing the princess, +1xCP for every unused Benny, +X xCP for number of turns "protecting" or "stealing" the treasure, etc. So at the end of every battle, heroes and/or squads of figs would have a pool of xCP that the player would need to keep track of.

In between battles (or during battles if you really wanted to), xCP could be cashed in to upgrade a minifig's stats. xCP costs essentially mirror normal CP costs. So, for example, increasing skill from 1d6 to 1d8 simply costs 1 xCP. Upgrading from a normal fig to a Pilot costs +1 xCP. Leveling up to a "juggernaut" (i.e. gaining the armored bonus and movement penalty) costs 2 xCP. This system obviously requires one to know the finer points of the rules from the chapters on MOC statistics.

In longer campaign games where leveling up might take longer or "cost" more experience points, we also modified the xCP costs to follow the following formula. For a given upgrade cost, xCP cost = N + CP cost (where N equals the number of upgrades a minifigure has alread received in that statistic). And example of this would be Hero von Bragstein pays +1xCP to increase his mad scientist skill rating from 1d6 to 1d8 (since the normal CP cost to do this would have been 1 CP); if he wishes to further increase his skill to 1d10, it will cost him another +2 xCP (under normal circumstances, increasing from 1d8 to 1d10 minifig skill would be 1CP; another +1 xCP is added since Bragstein had already received an experience upgrade to skill) Thus the total xCP cost to go from 1d6 to 1d10 skill would have been 3 xCP.

We also had an established spectrum to represent "maximum" minifig attributes to know when you could not "level up" an ability any further. We also limited a given hero to 4 or 5 special abilities if he/she had enough xCP to get that many...

I translated most of the Plastik Armory Abilities into BrikwaRPG costs. I've pasted a short description of each ability from the thread.:

Berserker: +5 points cost, gains Berserker ability (After any successful kill, the minifig flies into a beserk rage, and may take a free melee attack (including an angry inch) against a new target! This cannot chain off from charges, however.)

Gun-Kata: +5 points cost, (The minifig may treat ranged weapons as if they were melee weapons; they may use an angry inch, use two small arms against the same target simultaneously, and counter-attack with their guns. They still may not parry attacks, or use their guns as parts of charge attacks.)

Skirmisher: +4 points cost, (This minifig may carry and use any size 1 weapon in their off-hand while carrying a heavy CC weapon in the other.)

Shield Wall: +4 points cost, (When they are able to place their shield within touch of at least two other friendly shields, they may form a shield wall, automatically parrying any attacks coming from the direction of their shields. Shields on top blocking attacks from above must touch at least four other shields.)

Grenadier: +6 points cost, (As either a standard action or as part of reloading an explosive weapon, grenadiers are able to generate one MkI explosive per turn. In addition, they may upgrade MkI explosives into MkII explosives as another full action. They may NOT share their grenades with others.)

Have-At-You: +4 points cost, (The minifig may parry and riposte without penalty)

Rogue: +4 points cost, (The rogue may steal an object from another minifig at a use rating of 5, and may also deal an extra 1d6 damage if they attack someone from full cover or from behind.)

Sniper: +5 points cost, (When stationary and aiming, this minifig may elect to flip a coin instead of making a normal attack. On a heads, boom, headshot! a single brick element within range (including height and scope modifiers) is destroyed, usually a poor minifig's head. On a tails, the sniper misses, and must find another spot 5" away to try from. Snipers must also operate alone, and cannot use this ability within 6" of a friend or foe. Instead of destroying the brick, sharpshooters may also use their bullets or arrows for more precise manipulation of levers and buttons, and even perform "trick shooting.")

Last Stand: +5 points cost, (Upon death, minifig is allowed to remain alive and dying until the end of their next turn. They may not move, and may only spend an action.)

I'll Be Back: +6 points cost, (Upon death, roll a d6. On a 6, the minifig arises on it's next turn. Roll only once per fig.)

Duelist: +4 points cost, (May challenge opponents up to 12" away. May negate all cover and feces target to spend no actions that do not include them, but the enemy also gets a +1 bonus to hit.)

I have also made my own abilities, some of which were adapted from Silverdream's concept:

Trollolol: +4 points cost, can roll against another unit's skill. If the troll's roll is higher, the target will be forced to vent his rage by attacking a randomly selected unit of any allegiance within 1d6 range of him.

Seductive: +6 points cost. Can roll against another unit's skill, and if the character with this ability rolls higher, the target is forced to do whatever she wants. Does not work on robots, Math/CS teachers, or other socially-awkward minifigs.

I'm also experimenting with "negative" abilities that cost a negative amount and have bad effects, i.e. "Being silver dream", "cowardly," etc. Thoughts? The main point behind BrikwaRPG is in having a variety of abilities so we can make unique characters.

Silverdream wrote:Bad Traits-Gland Problem. Cost -3. Gets -3" of movement.-Useless. Cost: -2. Starts with 1d4 skill instead of 1d6.-Disabled. Cost: -1. Can only move in a wheelchair.-Old. Cost -1. Cannot use computers or complicated gadgets including keypads, ATMS, communicators or cellphones.-Unlicensed. Cost: -2. Cannot drive anything with a motor.-Tween. Cost: -1. Enemies will take priority in attacking you.-Racist. Cost: -2. Cannot deal with any other races without offending them, and provoking them into violence.-One Eyed. Cost: -3. Cannot make accurate single shots with a gun.-One armed. Cost: -4. Only has one arm, will provoke certain people into violence.-Ugly. Cost: -3. NPCs will only talk to you if you have money.-Secretly Three Ducks. Cost: -6. When killed, three actor ducks with 1d4 skill will pop out of your body, and you will play as them until you find a new costume. They cannot wield weapons and only speak duckese.-Reluctant Warrior Cost: -2. You don't really want to kill anyone, but sometimes you have to. -1 to all damage rolls with melee weapons.-Coward Cost: -3. -1 to skill when outnumbered. -2 to skill when outnumbered twice over.-Tribal Cost: -3. Can only use firearms as random objects, and cannot wear armor.-Darker Knight. Cost: -4. Must kill any character who has committed heinous, evil or corrupt crimes at any point in their life. Includes smaller evils such as jaywalking, keeping too much change, or talking in the theatre. Will not kill self in this case due to the idea of gritty redemption.-Hunger. Cost: -5. After something dies, this minifig must attempt to eat it or drink it's blood.

Colette wrote:I translated most of the Plastik Armory Abilities into BrikwaRPG costs. I've pasted a short description of each ability from the thread.:

Yes. But I think I find the "limit" mechanic kind of clunky requiring some extraneous calculating and math that is not necessarily intuitive with the base 2010 rules set.

I'm not even sure the system my friends and I cooked up does it well, but I feel like an experience-based system that mirrors the already existing CP system would be easier and more intuitive.

Your system seems to work better with a quest-oriented RPG. Mine is more like leveling up by killing stuff. Then again, I wrote this ruleset after an intense calculus session so that would probably explain the terminology and math required.

Colette wrote:Your system seems to work better with a quest-oriented RPG. .

A true assessment. This was based on Mordheim which itself was a "quest" style tabletop wargame. Ironically, we've never really tested it out, either. We developed it at the end of college before parting ways into the real world.